


Bent Double

by witchoil



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ballet, F/M, Teacher-Student Relationship, rating will change in later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:42:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23354851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witchoil/pseuds/witchoil
Summary: In the summer before her final year at the Shinra School of Dance, Aerith dances in a summer exchange program with Midgar Ballet Theater. It's her best opportunity to kickstart her career, to train among elites, and to finally dance with Sephiroth, whom she's looked up to since childhood.To sweeten the deal, he's requested that she work with his personal teacher, Tseng.Only time will tell what his peculiar methods may yield.
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough/Tseng, Zack Fair & Aerith Gainsborough
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	Bent Double

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO. IT'S ME. yes im writing underage fic. yes im writing for a ffvii rarepair i'm not even that attached to. when have i ever had control over myself or my life???? never.

The moment Aerith raised her front heel into a patient  _ tendu _ , she knew the part would be hers. Just like her audition for the Shinra School of Dance five years ago, an excited hum climbed up her spine and made her tongue tremble in her mouth. She smiled. 

Prokofiev’s strings broke open on a tender chord and Aerith tilted her head, sweet and guileless, as she stepped into the audition choreography. Not a single thought crossed her mind as she swept across the floor. Here, her body thought for her. From a confident  _ pique _ to the gentle  _ pirouette  _ in attitude, it was as if the fibers of her muscles knew precisely where they had to be without Aerith’s input at all. Because they did. 

The piece was from Romeo and Juliet, set to the music of the balcony scene  _ pas de deux _ but choreographed for a single dancer. Apparently only the selected dancer would actually get to learn the _pas de deux_. Aerith suspected that was as much out of ease of audition as it was because Scarlet hadn’t finished choreographing it yet. Despite her long tenure at the Midgard Ballet Corps and her status as directrix of the summer exchange program with the Shinra School, she wasn’t known for being particularly prepared. Not like Aerith. 

For two tireless months, she had spent every waking moment practicing for this and every sleeping one dreaming about it. Near the end, she’d suspected even Vincent was tired of watching her do it. But she knew as she struck the final pose -- back arched in a  _ cambre derriere  _ and front foot turned achingly outward in a last  _ tendu _ \-- that it had all been worth it. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes as she gazed softly at her hand. It hung cupped in the air above her, as though curling around the neck of a lover. 

She breathed as softly as she could through gently parted lips and let her eyes drift closed as the music cut out. 

A soft clapping echoed through the practice room, followed by Reeve’s sing-songy baritone. “Thank you, Ms. Gainsborough. That was lovely. Elena, you’re next.” 

Aerith gave one last perfect, beaming smile to the set of instructors gathered in the corner of the room and stepped back into the line of girls at the wall. Reeve leaned in to whisper something to Scarlet that she hoped was praise. As the head of the Shinra School, he held some sway here, but Scarlet would ultimately make the decision. Well, Scarlet and the other party to the pas de deux, Sephiroth. 

He leaned gently against the glass. Distant as always, he observed the girls without ever commenting on their performance. But Aerith knew. She had been studying him and his performances for years. She would be embarrassed to admit it in polite company, but it had been her dream since she was 12. Dance with  _ the _ Sephiroth -- so good he was known by a mononym at 17 -- before her career was over. And here was a chance to do that before her career had even begun. 

Yuffie patted Aerith on the shoulder as she shuffled back into line with the rest of the girls, murmuring some encouragement Aerith couldn’t quite hear as she drank her water in long quaffs and scrutinized Sephiroth’s expression as Elena began her own audition. Nonetheless Aerith smiled shyly and turned her chin. “Thank you! I felt really good.” 

The other girls all danced well and Aerith did watch, but she knew by the end of the audition session that it hardly mattered. She had given it her all. She had sacrificed dozens of hours of sleep and more than one toenail to be better than perfect. She danced  _ inspired _ . 

At last, Reeve clapped and announced that the session was over, saying that the girls would hear more in a week or so. 

Aerith hung back, head held high enough to be noticed as she collected her bag, and swept by the instructors on her way out. She stopped where Vincent moped in a corner. He wasn’t judging. They both knew that. And yet--

“Don’t even ask,” he said in that familiar, low tone. “You were perfect.” 

“You think?” 

A rare smile tugged at the corners of her teacher’s mouth and he nodded, gravelly voice as soft as he could manage. “Go. You’ll hear back at the same time as the rest of them.” 

Zack was already waiting for her in the hallway and squeezed her close before she could even get a word in. His familiar laundry-and-cigarettes smell relaxed the tense muscles of her shoulders better than a warm pack. “You really broke that leg!” 

“Please,” Aerith scoffed dramatically, “you didn’t even see!” 

“Yes I did,” Zack protested. “I pushed all the other girls out of the way and watched right through the window.” He pointed at the little ten-by-ten-inch shatterproof window on the practice room door and Aerith couldn’t hold back her eye roll. In all likelihood he wasn’t lying but she was glad she hadn’t noticed. It would have been embarrassing to start laughing during her audition. 

A deep, soft voice puffed over Aerith’s shoulder. “Excuse me,” it said. 

Zack’s eyes didn’t go wide exactly, but a little dreamy. Just like everybody’s. 

“Yes?” Aerith asked, not trusting anything else to be the right response. 

Sephiroth Khanin blocked the flow of the hall with his presence as much as with his body. Like a rock in the middle of a river or a statue in a square, the other students moving to and from practices moved around him as though they didn’t notice. The perfect foot of space that surrounded him said otherwise. 

His silver hair was neatly piled at the nape of his neck except for a few wispy strands that framed his face and curled around the eerily pale skin of his shoulders. His eyes were trained in Aerith’s direction but she couldn’t meet them, no matter how closely she studied his face. 

“Here,” he said, discreetly offering her a blank card. “My teacher.” 

“Oh,” Aerith said, trying not to let her hand tremble as she reached out to take the card from him. On the reverse side was a hand-written number with a single letter beneath it. 

_T_. Of course, she knew who that was. Everyone did. You didn’t train the most famous principal dancer in Midgar and not get a fair bit of coverage in the art magazines. 


“I doubt he’ll have time for me. I’m still just--” 

Sephiroth made a noise between a hum and a cough, possibly the most subtle interruption Aerith had ever suffered. “He will. If you’re going to dance with me, he has room.” 

Aerith understood what was happening to her in that moment in the same way she might have understood finding herself in a cellar spinning straw into gold. She was being told, off the record, that a decision had been made. She would dance the pas de deux. Her head spun. 

She looked down, skin flushing hot. “Thank you.” 

Something like a smile pulled at the corner of Sephiroth’s lip. “I look forward to seeing what you can do.” 

Before she could breathe out a weak,  _ I do too _ , he was gone. Dissolved into the flow of the hallway like mist. 

Aerith looked around for Zack, her anchor, but he’d disappeared sometime after Sephiroth showed up. Bastard. 

_ A: where ARE YOU _

_ Z: I wasn’t going to just stand there!!!  _

_ Z: I’m on my way to conditioning now _

_ A: we’re having dinner tonight  _

_ Z: oh is mr. khanin paying? :P  _

_ A: no YOU are  _

_ Z: the things i do for love :I sometimes i feel like maybe you’re stringing me along _

\-- 

The rest of the day passed in a blur. The first week of conditioning with Scarlet and the other girls in the corps had been so brutal Aerith hadn’t even been able to keep her water down, but that day she hardly remembered it at all. She was too lightened by the knowledge that she would be dancing on stage with Sephiroth at the end of all this, in front of the city and the world. The voice of a little girl inside her sang all afternoon. A girl who had gone to the Shinra School at 12 for an audition she never thought she’d land, who’d seen Sephiroth graduate and pasted every poster he’d ever been on on her dorm room wall (and only sometimes kissed them before bed). 

It seemed not even Scarlet’s sour face could dampen that lightness. 

Her phone buzzed as she turned her tights up and slipped her feet into her street shoes. 

_ Z: yakisoba?  _

_ A: yesss please _

_ Z: happy audition cheat day!  _

_ A: [party popper emoji] _

\--

Aerith dodged the rush of dancers as she made her way out of the center and tapped out a quick text to Cloud. 

_ A: you working the counter today?  _

_ C: maybe _

_ C: usual?  _

_ A: for both of us, please!  _

The walk to the bodega where Cloud worked was warm and breezy, even as the sun began to set. And true to his word, he had her usual collection of essentials ready at the counter by the time she reached him. 

He greeted her with a grunt -- charmingly harsh for his soft face -- and the same deadpan as always. “Two green teas, a bottle of sangria, two Choco-Bo’s, and a pack of slims.” 

Aerith rolled her eyes as she fished her wallet out of her bag. “Slims? You know he likes the blacks.” 

“But  _ you _ like the slims. Eighteen gil.” 

Aerith smirked and handed over the money without protest. 

Zack buzzed her in almost before Aerith took her finger off the call button and she hopped up the steps in a way that felt goofy but right. She had their snacks and Zack was waiting for her and she had a whole career ahead of her that very well might actually make it off the ground. 

His apartment building was old in the way that wasn’t charming but did kind of disappear into background noise the more time one spent there. Meaning that, at this point, Aerith would be hard-pressed to differentiate it from a brand new Shinra condo complex. 

She still lived in the dorms of the School, but Zack technically graduated this year and as a result had to get his own residence. Not that she minded. She’d been living on her own for a long time but the dorms still made her feel like a child with the curfews and open-door policy for male guests. At least this summer they could hole up at Zack’s place and drink and smoke on the fire escape without major interference. 

He greeted her with his customary bear hug and, yes, the warm, greasy aroma of street cart yakisoba. 

“Ugh,” Aerith groaned into his shoulder, “you’re the best.” 

“What was I gonna do, say no?” 

They danced around each other in the cramped entryway as Aerith toed off her boots and Zack took their snacks to the kitchen. 

He cracked their canned teas and Aerith fell in a graceful, knock-kneed heap into the creaky wicker chair at the kitchen table. They both ate for at least five minutes before speaking again. It was Zack who broke the silence. 

“So, I don’t wanna pry, but how’d it go? With the big man?” 

“Oh my god--” Aerith choked on her noodles. She had been so momentarily absorbed in the base pleasures of salt and fat that she had forgotten she was living in a world where she was going to-- “I, um-- There’s not a super good way to--? Hmm.” 

“Did he reject your proposal of marriage?” 

Aerith balled up her oily napkin and chucked it across the table at Zack’s stupid, tanned face. “Shut up! I’m trying to explain.” 

He picked up the napkin with his chopsticks and examined it like a piece of fresh sushi. “Okay, okay. Take your time. But I am dying to know.” 

“So he came up to me. And he gave me this card, for his trainer.” 

“Like his personal trainer?” 

“Like his  _ teacher _ , Zack. Tseng.” 

Zack squinted, trying to follow a thread he couldn’t quite see. “Okay...”

“He told me to call him and start training.” 

At that, Zack’s eyes went wide, his brows shooting up towards his widow’s peak. “ _ What? _ ”

“ _ Yeah _ , that was my reaction.” 

“That guy has a waitlist a mile long, and all the people on it have permanent jobs at established theaters.”

“His wait list is actually, like, three years long. I’ve asked around.”

“So how the hell--?” 

“I don’t know.” Aerith reached into the pocket of her shorts and pulled the card out, partially to see if it held any clues she had missed the first time, partially just to assure herself it was real. But it was. A little crumpled, a little worse for wear, but it was real. “A personal favor, I guess.” 

Zack’s mouth thinned out as he thought it over. “But then, why…” 

Aerith could feel her face get hot again, just like earlier. She looked up at Zack and when their eyes met he blinked rapidly, understanding without her having to say it. “He said that if I was going to dance with him, then Tseng would have room for me.” 

Zack made a choked noise of joy, the human equivalent of a dog barking around a tennis ball. “No way! Aer!” 

Aerith’s whole body clenched up in excitement, all of it finally becoming real now that Zack knew. Her smile scrunched up her entire face. Her toes curled. 

“I have to hug you again,” Zack said, pushing his chair back. 

\-- 

Aerith wished she could stay at Zack’s for six more hours, but she forced herself to leave as the sunset faded into twilight. She didn’t want to walk back to the school totally in the dark, nor did Zack want her to. Of course, he’d offered to walk her back, but she declined. She wanted to be alone with her thoughts. Zack ribbed her back, saying she just wanted to sniff the business card some more. Aerith swatted him but couldn’t put up too much of a fight. He had seen all of her posters, after all. 

The walk itself was quiet. And for all the thinking Aerith had intended to do -- serious thinking about the ethics of agreeing to be taught by a teacher she had no real right to, or taking a role that hadn’t been justly auditioned -- she found herself lost in fantasies about the summer showcase and beyond. What would it be like to walk on stage with him at curtain call? Who might see their dance and call her in for a fast track audition at the Theater? What if -- and this was a big if, but one she couldn’t help but entertain -- she caught the eye of Rufus Shinra? Could she have the chops to dance with the Turks? 

Aerith shook her head to rid herself of the ridiculous thought, still smiling somewhat dumbly as she did, only to realize she was about to walk past the school. Goddamn her head was in the clouds. 

Aerith hustled her way up to her dorm and fell into the absent-minded routine she walked through every night. At last, after she was washed and braided and stretched and in her comfiest pajamas, she plugged her phone in by her bedside and pulled back the covers. The screen of her phone blinked back at her. 

_ Z: so did you call him? Was his voice as sexy as they all say? _

She wanted to roll her eyes and smack him on the shoulder. 

_ A: of course not. I was too busy sniffing his business card, remember?  _

_ Z: are you going to?  _

_ A: idk… _

_ Z: no time like the present, right?  _

_ A: you just want to meet him yourself! _

_ Z: can you blame me? ; )  _

_ Z: [sent a photo] _

A dated theater bill showcasing Tseng’s legendary extension and his nearly-as-legendary bulge made Aerith want to throw her phone across the room. 

_ A: shut uuuuuup, this isn’t about him!!!! _

_ Z: of course not, it’s about my distinguished fellow alumnus, THE sephiroth _

_ A: oh my god im going on do not disturb  _

_ Z: [sent a photo] _

Aerith nearly squealed in horror at the image. Goddamn him. It was from an old yearbook Aerith had found in the school library when she was 15. On this particular page, she had highlighted Sephiroth in his class’ photo with an ever-so-sophisticated heart drawn around his face. She had had it bad for him then and sometimes still got flutters from looking at one of his headshots for too long, but her crush now was more  _ professional _ . Which Zack  _ knew. _

_ A: GOOD NIGHT.  _

Antagonistic as Zack could sometimes be, he didn’t actually text her again aside from saying goodnight. But Aerith thought about what he had asked -- why hadn’t she called him? It felt...strange to admit to being party to this underhanded 

Before she could question herself, the line had stopped ringing and a hollow click signaled that her quarry had answered. A pleasant, even voice greeted her. “Hello?” 

“Hi.” 

“Ah, who is this?” 

“Aerith,” she said, a lilting pause hanging over the line before she remembered to say her last name, “Gainsborough.” 

“Hello Ms. Gainsborough. May I ask why you’re calling me this evening? I’m in the middle of a session.” There was a slight reverberation on the other end of the line, as though he were standing in a practice room. 

“Sephiroth told me to be in touch. About the dance. And about training me. He said you’d have room.” 

Aerith could hear the thump of a hard-landed jump and a quiet crack in the background, like a muffled clap. A few stray notes of music mingled with a  _ hmph _ . “Calling me before they’ve even released the call sheet. That’s...brave.” 

“I figured I shouldn’t waste the time.” 

“Ha. I’m glad to hear that. Are you free this weekend?” 

“Yes. There’s no program practice on Saturdays.” 

“And you don’t mind losing your day off?”

“Of course not.” 

“Good. I take it you know where I train?” There was a rush of wind on the other end of the line and Aerith couldn’t help but imagine a dancer whipping past in a series of tight  _ chaîné  _ turns. Perhaps Sephiroth himself, doing a little extra training to make up for a day of watching auditions. 

Aerith licked her lips. “Yes.” 

“Come by at eight.” 

“Thank you,” Aerith said. “I look forward to working with you.” 

“The feeling is mutual. Have a good night.” 

Aerith’s heart raced like a hare’s in her chest as she put the phone down. Three days. Three days until she was in Tseng’s studio, working with someone famous enough to go by a mononym. God, she needed to work on her turnout. She went to bed giggling. 

\--

Aerith would have thought that it was impossible to be surprised by the stature of someone when she had known their height and weight since she was nine years old, but she was still taken aback when she had to turn her face up to greet him. 

She wasn’t short for a woman or a dancer, but he was nearly as tall as Sephiroth. 

It was arresting to look into those gold-brown eyes in person, but Aerith forced herself to keep eye contact as she shook his hand. She wasn’t a wilting flower, nor some naive girl who could be manipulated for attention. Or… she kept eye contact with the bridge of his nose, at least. 

“Hi,” she said again, the same as over the phone. 

His face tensed briefly, not in an unkind way, but in the way of a person who didn’t make a habit of smiling. “Good morning, Ms. Gainsborough.” 

“You can call me Aerith.” 

“Let’s get a little more familiar first, hm?” 

Aerith’s mouth quirked at that. She hadn’t been trained by anyone she hadn’t known for at least two years in, well, three years. “Sure. What should I call you?” 

“No need to call me anything, at least not while we’re here. Unless you mean to be talking to someone else?” 

“Not really. Except closer to the dance, maybe, if--” 

“Of course,” Tseng said as he stepped back from Aerith. He crossed the room to the speaker system and the familiar static of a many-times-copied CD filled the air. The tinkling notes of a familiar impromptu almost drowned him out. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there. For now, the barre.  _ Pliés _ , if you will.”

For her warmup, Tseng did not speak to or touch Aerith. Keeping a modest distance, he seemed content to watch her form. He didn’t offer feedback, either, when she finished, just set her to  _ tendus _ and  _ dégagés _ . So it went for nearly a half-hour at the bar. 

Tseng didn’t knit his brows, but they angled down so sharply that he bore a permanent look of concentration. Aerith might have found it charming if she weren’t its sole point of silent focus. He looked like he was taking notes furiously, just not on paper. She wondered as she did  _ pirouettes _ on the floor whether he was one of those people who could fully catalogue every movement and line just like that, like a video. She supposed it shouldn’t surprise her. 

Aerith spotted with the clock as she spun across the floor, wondering how it had gotten to be nearly ten and Tseng still hadn’t said anything to her other than blithe instruction on what he wanted to see next. Or maybe that wasn’t what he was signalling at all -- he never said so she couldn’t be sure. The thought made her chuckle quietly as she came to a stop. 

“ _ Piqué  _ turns. Something funny?” 

Aerith’s chest rose and fell with her breath. She sipped at her water. “No, my mind was just wandering.” 

“Where to?” 

Aerith shrugged. Little hairs stuck and unstuck themselves from her neck as she moved, curling in the sheen of sweat there. “Nowhere in particular. I just don’t think I’ve gone this long without being corrected in--” she thought back to her early years at the School, then before, in the living room with her aunt where she would dance along to the crackling radio, “well, ever.” 

“Do you mind?” Tseng asked. 

“You’re the expert,” Aerith said after another swallow of water.

“Don’t worry, I’ll correct you plenty. Today I’m just getting to know how you dance. Like a baseline.” 

“That makes sense.” 

“But you’re not used to it.” 

“Most of my teachers have been quick to, uh, cut to the chase.” 

“Trust me when I say I don’t waste time. Least of all my own. It’s just a part of my process.” 

“I trust that.” 

Tseng’s eyes narrowed. “Me? Or my process?” 

“Like you said earlier, let’s get to know each other a little more first.” 

“Hn. Diplomatic. I think I might see why he picked you, Ms. Gainsborough.” 

Aerith tossed her stainless steel water bottle back to where it had been nestled in her open bag. It made a hollow sound as it landed.  _ Thunk _ . “I appreciate the sentiment but he chose me because I’m the best.” 

Aerith did her best to pin him with her eyes. She knew where this kind of banter went if she was too open to it. She’d had brushes with it before and knew other girls who’d had more than brushes. Only being seventeen wasn’t as much of a deterrent as people liked to believe. 

Tseng blinked. He tilted his chin as though trying to see her from a different angle. His skin looked alarmingly soft, even in the harsh studio lights, and his face cut a feminine edge with the way his eyes softened to look down his nose. At last that look of concentration seemed to melt away.

Aerith began to rise onto the ball of one foot and fell back, pinned in turn. 

“I’m sorry,” Tseng said, “to have offended you. I didn’t mean any disrespect. Nor did I mean to imply that he would make a final choice on anything other than your ability. He’s not that kind of man.” 

“No,” Aerith said, “he’s not.” 

“You know him?” 

Aerith remembered her first spring recital at the school, to watching Sephiroth dance Albrecht’s demise with an anguish beyond his years but familiar to her all the same. She remembered her third year, when he’d briefly returned as a teaching assistant and gave her a month of lessons that changed how she thought about dance. She remembered the day she’d graduated and spotted him speaking with Vincent near the fountain; how he’d greeted her, how he’d remembered her name. 

“We’ve met,” Aerith said. 

“Hm,” Tseng said. “He leaves an impression, doesn’t he?” 

Aerith crossed her arms. “What next?” 

“Your audition, if you don’t mind.” 

Just as he promised, Tseng didn’t critique her audition solo, either. Just leaned his weight against the back of a folding chair and watched. Maddeningly silent. 

At the end, Tseng shuffled back to the CD player and nodded, as if along with the music that had just finished playing. “Good. Again.”

The second time wasn’t as smooth as the first, but Aerith found herself pushing a little further, felt her lines extending longer. When she came down to finish her breath came fast but easy. 

Tseng was still standing by the speaker system, his hand curling over the end of a smooth wooden yardstick. Again he nodded.

Again he said, “Again.” 

This time there was no music, but Aerith didn’t mind. The music brought the emotion to the surface, but it was hardly the driver behind it. This time she leaned into each movement, heedless of the timing, trusting her body. She felt smooth and sharp, like an unbroken stream of water. 

This time, when she finished, Tseng clapped. 

“There we go,” he said, half under his breath. “I think that’s all I need for today.” 


End file.
